Um, I recall Salon being quite supportive of Howard Dean. In fact, it seemed at the time that only Salon was supportive of the poor guy. I agree that he'd've made a fine president if elected, but would he have beaten Bush?

Don't forget "I am not a crook"!

Germany opened a for-women brothel. It sputtered along for a short time and then tanked altogether. I'd guess we'd see the same thing, here.

Maybe Salon should blogify The Fix, and have a clean division of responsibilities established.

Don't women lust for shoes normally?

I've been reading about the Republicans' impending fall in Salon for many years now. I'll believe it when I see it.

Because they're not. They're doing a job (usually several), and if they weren't doing it, they'd have to pay someone else to do the job(s). Day care, housecleaning, and so forth isn't free and isn't laziness.

There is no possible way any reasonably intelligent adult could not see the implication that Murtha was being insulted as a coward in that quote.

Fortunately, I can buy anything I'd normally buy at Target at another store. Unfortunately, that other store is Wal-Mart.

I'm not even going to address the absurd conspiracy theories being bandied about here.

I do have to say that comparing Halliburton to Salon is remarkably disingenuous. Salon is not a government contractor; Salon is not funded directly by the federal government. Blumenthal did not sign contracts enriching Salon while a federal employee.

" What she was apparently saying was that the president, or possibly the whole nation would be cowardly to withdraw troops from Iraq prematurely."

Which just happened to be what Murtha, mentioned in the same sentence, had so recently advocated. So, what exactly is your argument, here?

Hey, cosmicmojo, get a mirror.

You swallowed that one way too easily. The real point they're trying to push isn't fathers rights at all; their point is to re-define a fetus as a child and pregnancy as a condition of the child rather than of the woman. And you bought it wholesale.

The father has rights and responsibilities regarding the child. He has neither regarding the medical condition of pregnancy, or even the status of a fetus.

" Kidneys don't have fathers. I would think that's a pretty big distinction."

First off, that's not true, kidneys have the same father their body does. Should your Dad have an equal right to you to take your kidney? Because that's what you're suggesting, here.

Second off, so what? You're simply avoiding the very valid point - which is that the choice has nothing to do with the fetus, and everything to do with the mother. Your "distinction" is irrelevant.

If a mother could absolve herself of responsibility in the same way people are suggesting men should be able to, then this wouldn't be an issue. But she can't. It's technologically impossible at this time; test-tube babies are still science fiction.

The idea that a man should be able to "financially abort" a child (i.e. resign all obligations to a child that he doesn't want) overlooks a couple factors.

First off, the obligation is to the child, who had no choice in the matter whatsoever. Once the child is born, both parents have responsibility; to allow either one to sign off without otherwise providing (adoption, etc.) is unfair to the child, who is the aggrieved - and helpless - entity (not the mother, not the father).

Second, the mother's right to "opt out" has nothing to do with the financial burden; it derives directly from the biological burden. The fact that this gives her a de facto financial choice is incidental to where the choice derives from. If it were merely an issue of finances, the women would have no right to an abortion in the first place, just like the man, or either party post-birth.

So, to sum up, the woman has a right to terminate the biological burden. This does not derive from any incidental financial "rights" (which frankly don't exist), and therefore is irrelevant to the case of the man, who is not pregnant.

" Either you believe in freedom of choice (for both men and women) or you don't."

When men get pregnant, I will fully support their right to an abortion thereof.

" A drunken night does not mean that I have to make consequence payments for the a couple of decades (unless of course I pick up an STD of course)"

Or you commit a crime, drive and get in an accident, fall off a balcony, etc., etc., etc.. There are any number of ways to end up in bad straights from a single drunken night, and while I'm sure you'd love to avoid any sort of personal responsibility for any of them, I can't help thinking that trying to dodge responsbility for a child may be the most reprehensible of the lot.

" Cecelie Berry draws an unwarranted and suspicious conclusion in her article, in that the "good news" is "Sometimes, you really are better off alone." Not quite. Rather: "it is better to be alone than in a bad relationship!" "

Cecelie's conclusion is better than yours - the study does not (and indeed cannot) demonstrate that you're always better off alone, even compared to a bad relationship.

Polls in general are bad enough; but I have some difficulty placing any credibility on such data gathered on the internet. It's very easy to skew or spoof, and nearly impossible to vet, randomize, or weed out unrelated factors.

" Why shouldn't I be here?"

Because you're a troll. You don't have anything useful, interesting, or enlightening to say, and instead spew insults and intentionally obnoxious rhetoric lacking in substance.

No matter how you try to dress it up, "hiring" someone without their consent is slavery. I'd hoped we were past that in this country, but regressives abound.

Are we ever going to be able to put this silly meme to rest?